Republican Joke Bill Reveals Weak Hand On Payroll Tax Cut

December 13, 2011

Bill Scher

Congressional Republicans have been in disarray since the President cranked up the pressure to extend the payroll tax cut before it expires this month, with some leaders swearing that Republicans really really would like to extend it but not if it means multimillionaires have to pay a penny more in taxes, and others undercutting that claim by arguing that it would be better if taxes went up in the middle class next year since what we should be doing is cutting taxes for multimillionaires anyway.

Senate GOP leaders have already failed twice to get their own caucus to support their own version of a payroll tax cut, severely weakening their negotiating leverage.

(Also, the House bill would cut the current time the jobless can receive unemployment insurance — at a time when the number of jobless vastly outstrips the number of job openings — from 99 weeks to 59 weeks. By depriving people of money to spend on necessities, Repubkicans would cut demand and kill jobs.)

This only papers over the reality that much of the Republican Party simply believes that taxes on the middle class and the poor should go up and taxes on ther wealthy should go down.

And more that cruel, bizarre and untenable view is understood by the public, the harder it will be for the relatively saner Republicans to keep their usual obstructionist united front.

The Democrats maintain their strong hand. The Keystone pipeline is not some killer wedge issue. For one, most folks don’t know what it is. Two, most folks aren’t angling for one of the handful of jobs the project would create.

And most importantly, no one is going buy that Republicans are so adamant about creating a few thousand jobs when they have repeatedly obstructed bipartisan proposals that would create millions of jobs.

Democrats should persist in holding the line. Republicans are still on the verge of cracking.

But considering Trump said he wants to "drain the swamp," you might be surprised he picked someone who literally built the swamp. Scott Pruitt is a pioneer in turning government over to corporate special interests.

1300 Carrier manufacturing jobs are still going to Mexico. And the 800 jobs staying in Indiana aren't safe, because Carrier is moving to automate much of the work, with the help of the American taxpayer.

About Bill Scher

Bill Scher is the Online Campaign Manager at Campaign for America's Future, and the executive editor of LiberalOasis.com. He is the author of Wait! Don't Move To Canada!: A Stay-and-Fight Strategy to Win Back America, a regular contributor to Bloggingheads.tv and host of the LiberalOasis Radio Show weekly podcast. He has opinion articles that have been published by the New York Times, Minneapolis Star Tribune and Omaha World-Herald, and has made appearances on CNN, MSNBC and NPR among other TV and radio outlets.